Apple Releases iOS Patch For Jailbreakme Flaws

Two separate vulnerabilities combined to grant a PDF file the ability to take complete control of the computer. Apple issued the fix with uncharacteristic speed.

Apple has released iOS versions 4.0.2 and 3.2.2 to fix the vulnerabilities which made the jailbreakme.com exploits possible. The updates are available for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

The first error is a stack buffer overflow in the FreeType, the code which handles PDF files, in the handling of CFF opcodes. The result of an exploit is running arbitrary code. The second error is an integer overflow in the handling of IOSurface properties which allows privilege elevation from user to system privileges. The result of the two attacks combined is a PDF file which grants the attacker complete control over the system.

Apple's history of patch development doesn't often show examples of fixes this quickly. Clearly they can do it when they need to.